According to documents filed by borough police Tuesday in the office of District Judge Jerry Cartwright, Lagana is on unpaid leave from his custodial job with the district.

District representatives, including Superintendent Frank Aloi, could not be reached Thursday afternoon. Court documents said that Lagana’s attorney is Ryan Long, who also could not be reached for comment Thursday.

According to court documents, Lagana and a female custodian were working at Walnut Ridge the afternoon of June 30 when Lagana went into an office with the woman and sat on her lap. The Ledger is not using her name because of the nature of the charges.

She pushed Lagana away, and he stood up, but quickly sat down again. Lagana leaned into the woman and asked her to rub her chest against his back, according to the affidavit.

The woman told police she pushed Lagana again and he stood up, but he fondled her breasts and complimented her in vulgar terms as she tried to leave the room. Lagana left the building around 2 p.m., according to the affidavit.

Police said the woman reported the incident to Chris Thompson, the district’s superintendent of buildings and grounds, who forwarded the allegations to district administration, who suspended Lagana and contacted authorities.

But according to the documents filed with Cartwright’s office, Lagana is being charged only for the latest in a series of incidents going back several years.

After the reported incident, police said the district transferred the woman to another school, where she would be working with predominantly female staff. At the second school, the woman mentioned the complaint to another custodian.

In the affidavit, the second custodian is quoted as telling the victim: “I know who did this. Gary Lagana.”

When interviewed by police as part of the June 30 investigation, the second custodian said she was working with Lagana in the art room at Lincoln High School years earlier when he forced her against a counter and kissed her.

The police investigation also turned up two other people, a teacher and a third custodian, who said Lagana touched them inappropriately. The teacher said Lagana rubbed against her breasts, then apologized when she confronted him over it.

The third custodian said Lagana rubbed against her repeatedly in an incident at least five years ago at one of the district’s schools. As with the teacher, the third custodian confronted him, and Lagana apologized.

“You touch me again, and I’m going to knock you on your ass,” she told Lagana, according to the affidavit filed with Cartwright.

After that incident, the third custodian approached then-superintendent Francis Keller, who retired several years ago and was replaced by Aloi. The third custodian said she was told the administration would follow up on the report, but she told police no administrator approached her until Alfonso “Butch” Angelucci, assistant to the superintendent, spoke with her after the Walnut Ridge incident.

Eric Poole can be reached online at epoole@ellwoodcityledger.com.

A FORMER COACH

In addition to his work as an Ellwood City Area School District custodian, Gary Lagana has been an assistant football coach at Riverside and Lincoln high schools, dating to the 1980s, according to Ellwood City Ledger files.

At that time, he was on the staff of Mark Mangino, now the head football coach at Kansas University and the reigning Associated Press NCAA Coach of the Year.

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